How big was KARA in Japan?

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    tbh I'm a fan of KARA(they're like the only 2nd gen group I'm a fan of along with SNSD) and whenever people bring up the pioneers for KPOP in Japan it's always KARA, BoA and TVXQ. If you look at videos of their concerts there, the crowd is always HUGE and there are lots of clips of them on Japanese TV too.


    But just how big were they over there? Were they competing with popular Japanese groups at the time? Did they manage to sell alot there? I feel like I need an explanation because I have a good grasp of how big BoA and TVXQ were there, but I'm not too sure about KARA. :/:/:/:/:/

  • THEY were huge. They have millions of dollars worth cfs in japan than korea at point and they had best contract than other girl groups,with dsp sharing half of profit even in albums cfs, concerts


    Thats why they are consider s tier rich girl group, with real estate worth tens in millions per member, which they invested and have never need to work again. They made that money in japan. They might lack big hits in korea than other ggs, but they are the super richest , because of their success in japan.

  • Fairly high up. Not the big blowouts though.

    If you go by Album charts they had only 2 good years being 2011 and 2012. They were ranked #9 with SNSD ranked #3 in 2011. In 2012 they were ranked #4 in Album sales their best year. They next year they were in the 90s and then out of the chart after that. They also didn't chart in 2009-2010.


    For singles chart 2011 was their best year with 2 songs charting in the top 20 but not the top 10. Also for the Hot 100 they had a #8 song and a #12 song.

    As a contrast that same year AKB48 had a #1, #2, #4, #6 song on the Hot 100. This was when AKB48 were at the top of their game.


    So that more or less comes down to they were most likely a top 3 girl group in 2011 and 2012. So they had marginal impact. It was brief and explosive for a KPOP group but they didn't have the lasting power of the other big named Japanese groups of the time.

  • biggest korean GG in japan history. It is also the one with the greatest recognition of the GP, even 10 years after its peak, people still remember them


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  • They where basically everywhere. When i went to japan in 2012 they where EVERYWHERE and i mean everywhere, there songs where playing in malls, out on the streets in the local clubs. My Japanese friend said he thought that they where from japan, cause of how well they spoke japanese. Hara and jiyoung where the most popular in japan espically hara, she looked like namie amuro who at the time was making her return to the jpop industry in a big way as well. In the general public Kara was very well known and liked, snsd was known among the teenage groups, where as kara was known by virtually any age group among japan. The only group closest to matching them in terms of popularity in japan from the kpop industry is SNSD and twice. SNSD and Kara made it huge in japan so other ggs from korea could do the same thing.

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